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YA Wednesday: A Q&A with Alyssa B. Sheinmel

Back in January we expanded our Best of the Month program
to include three more titles in addition to the spotlight recommended read.
With so much great YA fiction out on the market it became harder and harder to
choose only one book every month, and since YA readers span so many
sub-genres--from science-fiction & fantasy and literature to paranormal
romance and graphic novels--we thought, the more the merrier!

This month, one of our picks is The Lucky Kind by Alyssa
B. Sheinmel. When high school junior Nick Brandt’s dad comes clean to him about
a long-kept secret, Nick starts to question his so-called perfect family and
must face that fact that things aren’t necessarily what they seem. Soon nothing
much is of interest to him—not even longtime crush/new girlfriend, Eden, with
whom he’d bonded only weeks before the big reveal. In this heartfelt story
about the emotional leap from childhood to adulthood, Sheinmel imprints the
exchanges and dialog between characters on the reader’s mind long after the
last page. Writing from the point of view of opposite gender to boot, Sheinmel
truly shines (heh!) in her second novel (The Beautiful Between, her
first,was well-received by the New York Post, Kirkus, and School
Library Journal).

For more on Sheinmel’s research and inspiration read our
Q&A with her below:

The characters are so well drawn and the emotions ring true. Does this book have a
personal connection for you?
Well, first of all, thank you! To be honest, I think every book I write has a
personal connection for me; even though I never went through much of what the
characters in The Lucky Kind go through, many of the characters’ traits
are inspired by real people and real stories.